


Home

by Doctorinblue



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: AU, F/M, Henry Lives, What Should Have Been
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-17
Updated: 2018-04-17
Packaged: 2019-04-24 09:32:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14352732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Doctorinblue/pseuds/Doctorinblue
Summary: Henry misses his plane, and finally meets his son (Henry lives, because I'm not cruel)





	Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [flootzavut](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flootzavut/gifts).



> Thank you so much flootzavut for the beta, and all your help!

He had barely survived the trip home, in much the same way he'd barely managed to not get shot or bombed or dysentery. Blind, stupid luck. He'd missed that doomed flight by ten short minutes. Ten minutes away from certain death, and at the time he hadn't a clue. He'd been drunk, and cursing, hating Korea and everything that kept him minutes more from his family and home. 

Now, with his heart hammering inside his chest, he knew just how close he had come to dying. Henry knew he should never have made it, should have been a statistic and a folded flag, instead of a man waiting for his life to carry on. Gripping his luggage tighter, his fingers aching with the effort, he kept his eyes focused ahead. He willed himself invisible to his fellow travelers, hoped to hell no one would notice him standing there - war-torn and nearly shaking. Or maybe that was only on the inside, his guts and bones rattling inside their shell. A coward through and through, him.

He exhaled roughly, almost a laugh at his own expense. Pierce would easily have joined in, taken the lead away from him again. Somehow Henry would come out feeling like his inadequacies were a mark of humanity. No Pierce here, though. No McIntrye to help him wash this feeling away, scrub his soul clean again. Or cleaner. Swallowing the all too familiar lump, the one he'd named 'family' long ago, Henry tried to ground himself in the here and now. He focused on the surrounding noises. No bombs. No bullets. And though the smell of blood seemed to cling to him - despite scrubbing his skin raw more than once since leaving the 4077 - it didn't linger in the air. He couldn't taste it any longer.

Food. He smelled real food, and perfume and cologne. He heard footsteps, so soft and slow. No running. No blackouts, with the ground shaking beneath his jelly legs. No one expected a life or death decision when he barely knew how much ice cream to order for the camp. It should feel like a relief. It didn't. After being overfilled for so long, the emptiness hurt like hell.

He shoved the feeling off, tried to bury it deeper inside. Soon, he'd have his arms around his children. He'd be able to kiss his wife like they had been worlds apart. And it would be them against the world, them raising the kids, them until the end. He'd meet his son properly, and drive that old car to that old house and thank God for this chance. This time almost did count. This time, he'd make the mundane matter.

And if he thought only of the Swamp as he counted heartbeats, if he still tasted the homemade booze, cheap and hot at the back of his throat, he couldn't be to blame. If he missed Radar so much it felt like it might split him open mid-airport, even as this family rounded the corner - well, time would have to deal with the memories, the wounds. He sure didn't know where to start. 

His two girls turned to blurs as they ran at him and he squatted down to meet them. His bones ached with years he hadn't actually lived. He'd aged there. His girls had aged, too. Inches taller, arms still so tiny as they wrapped him up tightly, fingers digging into his shirt. He lifted them off the ground, tucked his face into their heads and breathed in. They smelled like home and hope and sunshine. If the scent of war lingered on him, they would quickly drown it out. And if they never had to hear a single word of what he'd done, what had been done to him in Korea, he'd die a happy man. 

He kissed their cheeks, their heads, squeezed them once more before he let them go.

"Honey," he whispered, pulling his wife into his arms.

She laid her head over his heart, his son resting against his chest, and he held them both like his life depended on it - like he'd almost died on that damn plane. Like nothing else would ever matter again

"Ah, honey," he whispered, and if he cried, it wouldn't be the first time.

And when he pulled away, he looked down at his boy. His son. Born with him a world away, small cheeks and blond hair, and God, Henry had fallen in love each time he'd met his children and this was no exception. This kid just had a head start. 

Heavy in his arms and light in his heart, the ache in Henry's chest began to ease. A hug returned, by a boy who'd only heard his voice over the phone. He was was both father and stranger. 

Henry loaded them and his luggage into the car, slipped behind the wheel. He managed a smile for his wife, turned the key. The car sounded nothing like a jeep, and the paved roads felt hard and uncertain beneath his tires, and his grip on the wheel never loosened until he'd gotten them home alive. 

The girls argued in the back, and he smiled into the mirror. Like the old days, right? Like he'd never been gone, never filled his time with drinks and women. Like the war had never demanded more of him than anyone should have to give...and he'd been one of the lucky ones. He'd come home.

Then dinner. The food tasted like heaven ought to, and made him think of those still eating powdered and unidentifiable food. He ate too quickly, put the kids to bed, and left their doors open a crack. He'd see them tomorrow, he reminded himself over and over as he returned to his room. He'd promised himself he'd take his wife straight to bed, and he did, but he wanted nothing more than to hold her. To keep her close, and selfishly let her fill the holes Korea had left in him. 

It didn't help. 

Henry knew there would be letters. Maybe they would visit, and maybe they wouldn't, but he would tell them about birthdays and graduations, all about how his little family grew up around him. He wanted to write them until he was old and gray, and they were a little younger and gray, and hear all about how they had beaten the war together and apart. He needed to know his other family had beaten the odds, had found a way to make home home again. Henry pulled his wife in closer, closed his eyes, and for a moment he was back in the Swamp. Summer air hung thick and heavy on his skin, and laughter echoed in his ears. What if he never heard it again? What if the last goodbye had been goodbye, did he have enough of them to last until his dying day?

He let the imaginary wind roll over him, let himself be both there and here for a few moments longer. He'd figure out to live again. He just didn't know when.


End file.
